Inside Contactless to acquire Atmel’s secure microcontroller business

Inside Contactless has agreed to acquire Atmel‘s Secure Microcontroller Solutions (SMS) business, based in Rousset, France and East Kilbride, UK.

The financing for the purchase is being provided by Inside’s existing investors, led by Gimv and Sofinnova Partners, along with the French sovereign wealth fund, Fonds Strategique d’Investissement (FSI). Atmel is also to make an investment in Inside Contactless as part of the deal.

“Atmel’s Secure Microcontroller Solutions business offers Inside the opportunity to acquire unique people, skills and technologies to reinforce our leadership in the smart card and secure transaction devices market,” says Remy de Tonnac, chief executive officer of Inside Contactless. “Combining these businesses has the potential to be a game-changing event in the smart card industry. It will create a pure-play fabless semiconductor leader singularly focused on the secure transactions market.”

According to de Tonnac, this combination will put Inside in a leading position to meet the growing global demand for solutions in the payments market, the emerging NFC mobile commerce market and the electronic identification market.

“The SMS product portfolio and market focus is highly complementary to Inside Contactless’ current business,” explains Steven Laub, Atmel’s president and chief executive officer. “This deal should be beneficial to both the SMS employees and customers.”

The purchase is expected to be completed during the third quarter of 2010.